Back in March, the coronavirus started triggering infection hotspots in and around meatpacking plants, sickening and killing workers. As local public health authorities pushed giant meat conglomerates to close infected facilities, industry executives warned that doing so was “pushing our country per
Researchers from the University of Illinois and U.S. Department of Agriculture Agricultural Research Service report in the journal Science that crops engineered with a photorespiratory shortcut are 40 percent more productive in real-world agronomic conditions.
In recent years, crop insurance has become an increasingly controversial subject. While many support the program, others claim it sucks up too many taxpayer dollars. Reporters can use this guide to start their crop insurance research.
Farmland in Illinois, Iowa, Kansas, Minnesota and Nebraska are among the nine states in the country that sell 50 percent of the U.S. agriculture products while netting nearly $100 billion in total produce sales, according to U.S. Census data.
The Iowa Environmental Council is one of a series of environmental organizations that have joined together in a lawsuit against the EPA. The agency announced eight years ago that nitrogen and phosphorous were the primary agents in the creation of the dead zone.
The dead zone may seem like an abstract concept in Iowa, a state more than 800 miles to the north of the Gulf, but for fishermen in Louisiana the destruction is very real. Harmful algal blooms — the explosion of algae due to nitrogen and other pollutants — occur every year all along the coast of the
The Mississippi River Basin forms a large funnel, channeling nitrogen and other nutrients into the Gulf of Mexico, where a growing dead zone wrecks havoc on the marine ecosystems. The river basin includes parts of 31 different states, draining over 41 percent of the continental United States. With a
Everyday, Iowa’s rivers send massive loads of nitrogen through the plains of the Midwest, down the Mighty Mississippi and into the Gulf of Mexico. No, bloated fish carcasses are not surfing the waves of the Gulf. In fact, a birds-eye view of the Louisiana and Texas coasts might suggest life continue
Crop production will have to double by 2050 to fulfill the needs of a growing and increasingly affluent population. Meeting this challenge will be difficult but not impossible, according to the University of Minnesota’s Institute on the Environment.
